And often every gas station offers their special blend too. So those who want extra cleanliness for their engines should rather buy fuel that has additional additives pre-blended rather than doing it manually. Stations with no workers at all usually offer only 95, 98, Diesel, paper towels . Prices are almost the same but I love the "no need to wait" thing.

Windshield fluid pump is still very rare (invented in 2014 I think). Usually companies push their plastic bottles as they want no investments. I never buy that crap. Either concentrate (1:50) or just filtered water in summer.

While they aren't common by any means, I've seen them. And while I like the idea, it's always been to be priced higher than what I can get WW fluid on sale in 1g bottles, so I stick to the bottles. I suppose if everyone bought that way it would drop the price but now bottles occasionally go on sale for <$1 for the blue ones and ~$2 for the ones I purchase, the -30F orange or not blue which we really need in MN in the winter. The blue style just freezes as soon as it hits the windshield. I don't use water in the summer because I don't want it mixing with the orange stuff come winter and I don't want to worry about having to totally use up the water before adding the fluid. To each his own

GetOffYourGas wrote:I've never even heard of these windshield fluid pumps. Seems like it would save an awful lot of plastic bottles.

Considering how many people accidentally pump diesel into their gasoline-powered vehicle (and vice versa) I wonder how many people have accidentally pumped this into their fuel tank? Or just as bad, into the AdBlue tank of a diesel car? I can especially see this happening with a tourist who's not familiar with the local language and that such pumps for windshield washer fluid actually exist.

GetOffYourGas wrote:I've never even heard of these windshield fluid pumps. Seems like it would save an awful lot of plastic bottles.

Considering how many people accidentally pump diesel into their gasoline-powered vehicle (and vice versa) I wonder how many people have accidentally pumped this into their fuel tank? Or just as bad, into the AdBlue tank of a diesel car? I can especially see this happening with a tourist who's not familiar with the local language and that such pumps for windshield washer fluid actually exist.

Good point! That would be a costly (and embarrassing) mistake to make.

I'll be sure to be on the lookout for these next time I'm filling a rental car while visiting Estonia!

jjeff wrote:I don't use water in the summer because I don't want it mixing with the orange stuff come winter and I don't want to worry about having to totally use up the water before adding the fluid.

Constantly happens with me in the autumn. Just pull the lever and let the pure water just run out. You just need two extra minutes (or 20 seconds with headlight washers )Also summer fluids are always a ripoff. If freezing point is not important just use concentrate. You need like a tablespoonful for the whole tank. A bottle costs like 5€ but you get like 10-30 full refills (aka lifetime amount ) .Freezing is another story. There must be a lot of alcohol (toxic methanol or inefficient ethanol) blended so it doesn't freeze too early. Plus tablespoonful of some detergent.The only reason to use real summer fluid is for bug removal. Water does not dissolve them. More expensive stuff must be used. Concentrate also hardly helps. I just remove them manually as wiper blades get contaminated and leave streaks anyway.

RonDawg wrote:

GetOffYourGas wrote:I've never even heard of these windshield fluid pumps. Seems like it would save an awful lot of plastic bottles.

Considering how many people accidentally pump diesel into their gasoline-powered vehicle (and vice versa) I wonder how many people have accidentally pumped this into their fuel tank? Or just as bad, into the AdBlue tank of a diesel car? I can especially see this happening with a tourist who's not familiar with the local language and that such pumps for windshield washer fluid actually exist.

At least one - my fathers coworker - old papa with not a lot of brainpower.Even you guys should get the pictogram on the photo. There is a windshield wiper symbol.People are 100% responsible for being plain stupid. Imagine mixing up bleach with milk.Everything mentions what is what - everywhere. Even a "blind driver" can distinguish diesel smell from gasolines. And those from citrus. And those from urine (adblue is practically piss).

I'll be sure to be on the lookout for these next time I'm filling a rental car while visiting Estonia!

Just rent a Leaf - 3€ per hour or 30€ per 24hours, unlimited ChaDeMo, unlimited mileage. You need a cell phone to open/lock doors, no keys.Even then only add windshield fluid, not diesel, gasoline nor adblue Hard to plug CCS into ChaDeMo port.

arnis wrote:At least one - my fathers coworker - old papa with not a lot of brainpower.Even you guys should get the pictogram on the photo. There is a windshield wiper symbol.People are 100% responsible for being plain stupid. Imagine mixing up bleach with milk.Everything mentions what is what - everywhere. Even a "blind driver" can distinguish diesel smell from gasolines. And those from citrus. And those from urine (adblue is practically piss).

In North America people will look at you funny if you sniff the fuel nozzles They might even call the police on you ("huffing" gasoline fumes to get high is actually a thing in America). But possibly because of strict emission regulations (especially in California where I live), you really don't smell gasoline fumes from the pumps and nozzles unless someone has spilled fuel, often due to overfilling.

Blind people have a much more keen sense of smell (and other senses still remaining) than those who still have sight.

I can identify diesel nozzles because generally they're the greasiest, dirtiest one of the group. But not everybody knows this, especially in America where diesel power is rare unless it's a VW, Mercedes, or a 3/4 ton or larger truck, or something like a generator. And of course VW will likely no longer be allowed to sell diesels here after the mess they created for themselves.

Here in the US, diesel nozzles are often well separated from the gasoline ones if not their own separate pump to help prevent confusion. Note how besides being differently colored, the diesel nozzle is on the opposite side of pump the gasoline one in this example typically found in the US:

But it still happens. This commercial was created before the scandal, but Audi even made fun of it:

Diesel nozzle is bigger than gasoline nozzle and will not fit into modern gasoline vehicle.BMW even uses reversed protection: smaller nozzle will not fit into bigger diesel hole.I've heard that many manufacturers are now doing this kind of protection.

It is not going to ruin gasoline engine if you fill it with diesel. But diesel engine can easily be ruined with gasoline.Difference is at least 10-fold (cost to fix).

In addition to nozzle size difference in Europe all unleaded gasoline pistols are green.Now 100% of gasoline in EU is unleaded thereforeall gasoline nozzles are green. 95 and 98 both are green (or any other type of gasoline). It is safe to mix them up.Also very easy to remember: all dirty things are dark and ugly, so is a diesel nozzle, it is always black in EU. I believe some say KISS to that. Black and Green All flavors of diesels are still black. Winterized have a snowflake somewhere.Adblue has blue handle. And nozzle is even smaller than petrol.

Windshield washer fluid appears to be with a yellow handle. This is unused color for ages (years ago while Soviet Union was a thingthere were blue handles for leaded gasoline and yellow red for different octane ratings (much lower). All these are not used for decades).So yellow look like good color. I would rather use white as yellow is color for compressed gas (including CNG vehicle) though it isnot really possible to hook CNG nozzle into windshield wiper fluid reservoir

Trust me, it happens even with modern unleaded fuel cars and their narrower fuel openings. Maybe not often, but it's not impossible.

I actually came across a woman who had done just that. To make matters worse, the car she did this to was a rental. I told her to not start the car and helped her push it to a parking spot, where she called the rental car company for roadside assistance. I'm sure the rental car company was not happy with her and charged her credit card accordingly.

There is a UK firm called "Auto Fuel Fix" that says it's not common, but happens enough (25% of their calls for service) that they bothered to make a web page and video detailing what you should do should it happen to you: http://www.autofuelfix.com/blog/diesel- ... -and-video

According to Wikipedia:

Some different types of fuel have specially sized of nozzles to prevent accidentally filling a tank with an incompatible fuel. The nozzle on diesel pumps is supposed to be larger so that it cannot fit into the fillpipe on a vehicle tank designed for gasoline. However, the larger diameter diesel nozzles are not an actual requirement, and many diesel pumps at auto islands have been fitted with standard gasoline nozzles.

That could have been the reason why the woman I spoke to above was able to fill her gasoline tank with diesel.

Pump handles at US gas stations AFAIK are not required to be colored a certain way, so you can't rely on that. In the comment section of the CarTalk article I linked to above, someone complained that ALL of BP's nozzles (at least in the US) are colored green, the corporate color. The only exception I have seen is E85 which has been consistently colored yellow.

As Scott Adams, the cartoonist behind the famous "Dilbert" cartoons, once said: "You can never underestimate the stupidity of the general public."